


Respawn

by KateyLily



Category: Minecraft (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Can be platonic or romantic, F/M, Fluff, Friendship/Love, Hurt/Comfort, Respawning, Temporary Character Death, Video Game Mechanics, it’s up to you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-24
Updated: 2019-08-24
Packaged: 2020-09-25 07:51:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20373277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KateyLily/pseuds/KateyLily
Summary: The first time Alex died, she screamed.





	Respawn

**Author's Note:**

> I love Minecraft, it’s my favorite game and I’ve played it since I was a little kid. This is my first fanfic for it, and I wrote it all at once in like three hours. I hope it’s alright!

The first time Alex died, she screamed.

It had started out like any ordinary day. She had gotten up, talked to Steve, and eaten a quick breakfast of a loaf of bread and an apple. Afterwards, she did a few household chores (like organizing the chests—seriously, Steve, they’re  _labeled_), visited the farms, went fishing, took a quick lunch break, went hunting, and came back once the sun began setting.

Steve came in a few minutes later, covered in coal and redstone dust and lugging a diamond pickaxe slung over his shoulder. He paused at the doorway to the kitchen to wave briefly at her before he continued walking, boots leaving dusty footprints behind, and climbed down the stairs to the basement storage system.

She waved back, smiling, and then turned back to finish cooking the meat she had gotten earlier.

She had only been here for about a week, having suddenly woken up in an unfamiliar world with no memories except her name, utterly alone. With some buried survival instincts she didn’t know she possessed, she had successfully survived the first couple of nights before stumbling upon a large house. Both Alex and Steve were shocked to learn that they weren’t alone, but had been overjoyed as well.

Steve had been there a lot longer than she had; several years, in fact, if his stories were to be believed. He had suddenly woken up as well in this strange land with no memory except for his name, much like she had. According to him, the world had started off simple, but as he explored and walked further and further new mobs and blocks began popping up, and some vanished. He had invited her to stay with him, and she had accepted gratefully.

Over the next few days, they helped each other, sharing both the work and materials. Alex had been in awe over just how much  _stuff_ he had, but she supposed that was to be expected if he really had been living out here for years, all alone.

Sometimes she wondered how he had done it, actually stayed sane for all those years without any human contact, but he had assured her that he was fine. He told her stories about the villagers and various mobs he had run into, and about his old pet wolf who had unfortunately passed on while protecting him from a skeleton. He had never gotten a new pet, telling her that he never wanted to experience that kind of grief again. She was able to understand, imagining losing Steve. It hurt to think about.

He was very experienced, and taught her many skills, tips, and tricks to survive and make life easier.

One such trick was the good old-fashioned dirt tower. He explained that in the early days before he discovered compasses, he had built a large tower of dirt and placed torches on top to act like a sort of beacon to help him find his way home whenever he went exploring.

She had been excited to try it out for herself. He had warned her that it could be dangerous, especially at night when a mob could attack her, and nowadays it wasn’t necessary since he had compasses and an  _actual_ beacon (she was still astonished he had taken on the Wither—how cool was that?), but nonetheless she had still been eager to do it.

Why did she want to do it so badly? She supposed, in a way, it was a feeble attempt to try and make her feel like she was as cool as him. Horribly embarrassing, yes, and she wouldn’t admit it at bow-point, but a part of her knew it was true.

So, that night once she was sure Steve was sound asleep, she slowly got up and snuck out of the room, headed down to the basement. She grabbed a few stacks of dirt from a chest, wincing at the noise it made, and snagged a handful of torches before stepping out into the cool night air.

In hindsight, she definitely should have waited until morning, but she was already outside and might as well fully commit to it.

She walked the short distance to the river, as Steve had told her he built near a source of water so he could easily jump off, and began building.

At first, everything was just fine. As she got higher and higher and the amount of dirt in her inventory got lower and lower, her heart pounded in her chest, and with every block placed her excitement only grew.

Then, the trouble started. When she was about halfway up, she suddenly heard the familiar  _thwang_ of an arrow being fired. Surprised, she looked around, and noticed an arrow lodged in the block of dirt right under her feet. Before she could react, however, another arrow was shot, and it buried itself into her thigh.

Biting down on her tongue to suppress a scream (and only partially succeeding), she was suddenly aware that she was staring at the night sky, and the wind was rushing past her face. Her first thought was  _huh, it’s really windy tonight _and  _wait, why is the dirt tower in front of me_, then  _oh yeah I’m falling_, followed by  _I should have listened to Steve _and  _oh man, I’m actually going to_ die.

It was that last thought that made her pause before she panicked, flipping herself over to watch as the ground approached faster and faster. The skeleton had knocked her off from across the river, meaning she was speeding towards the solid ground and not the water.

The reality of her situation sunk in and she screamed, wind rushing past her ears and whipping her hair in her face. She squeezed her eyes shut as the ground came closer and closer, and her last thoughts were  _please don’t let this hurt_ and  _I’m sorry, Steve_.

She hit the ground with a sickening  _crunch_, but she didn’t feel a thing.

* * *

When Alex came to, she was surprised that she was still alive. Slowly she peeled her eyes open, and found herself staring at the ceiling of her’s and Steve’s shared bedroom. She blinked a few times and then attempted to sit up, half expecting to be hit with a wave of excruciating pain, but there was nothing.

She was completely fine.

Was it just a dream? It certainly _felt_ real, and usually the memories weren’t as clear in her nightmares, but she didn’t outright rule it out.

She looked over to her left, and was surprised to see Steve’s bed was empty. A quick glance through one of the windows revealed that it was still nighttime, and unless he was out mining or fighting mobs, he almost always preferred to sleep through the night.

She frowned and bit her lip worriedly. Was he okay? Why was he out? She gave the rest of the room a brief once-over, seeing no trace of him other than his bed covers looking like they had been hastily thrown off. Had she screamed out loud and woken him up? But, then, why would he be outside, instead of at her side gently shaking her awake like he normally did when she had a nightmare?

Before she could ponder this for long, however, the door to the bedroom burst open. Steve rushed in, wide-eyed and disheveled, but paused when he saw her sitting up in bed. The tension visibly melted from his figure, and he leaned against the doorframe, looking exhausted.

“Alex... you’re okay,” he breathed out, relief evident in his expression. Alex looked at him, concerned.

“Of course I’m alright. Are you?” She wondered what could have happened. Perhaps it was a bad dream, one where she had been hurt in some way.

He looked at her strangely, and she suddenly felt a bit self-conscious.

“You don’t... remember?” he asked slowly, puzzled. She returned his confused stare with one of her own.

“Remember what?”

“You fell off the tower,” he started, and Alex tensed. “You were hit by a skeleton, and you fell,” he elaborated.

“That wasn’t a nightmare?” she asked nervously. What had happened? She couldn’t remember anything after she hit the ground besides waking up in bed, so either Steve had nursed her back to health and she had been out for a  _long time_, or something else was going on.

He shook his head. “You can look for yourself if you don’t believe me. The tower’s still there.”

She did believe him, but she still needed to see it for herself, just to make sure. She got up and padded over to the window facing the river, looking out. Sure enough, the tower was standing right next to the river, just as she left it.

“I... b-but...” she felt herself at a loss for words. “_How_?” she eventually blurted out, distraught.

His face softened at seeing her distress. He slowly walked forward and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder, guiding her over to his bed. Her cheeks reddened slightly, but he didn’t seem to notice. They both sat down on top of the messy covers, and he took a deep breath before sighing.

“You died,” he stated bluntly, and she flinched. Noticing her reaction, he gently pulled her closer and wrapped his arms around her. She relaxed, inhaling his scent. He smelled like coal and grass, but she always found his presence comforting.

“You died, but you respawned,” he continued. Alex opened her eyes and peeked at him, expression thoughtful. Her memories were a bit muddled, but the word sounded familiar... somehow.

“What does that mean?” She asked quietly. He glanced down at her before looking away and continuing.

“I’m not too sure myself,” he admitted. “All I know is that in this world we can’t die, not really. Whenever I take enough damage, or do something that really should kill me, I just... wake up. Back in my bed, like nothing happened, except it _did_ happen. I lose all my stuff—“ Alex froze and realized that yes, the dirt and torches were missing, “—and I remember it happening, but I wake up fine. No injuries, even if I had some before I died, and I’m never hungry either.”

He paused his explanation in order to lay down, tenderly maneuvering her so that her head rested on his chest, but she found that didn’t mind. He began running his fingers through her hair as he continued to speak.

“I don’t know how it works. To my knowledge, the mobs we kill don’t respawn, only me—er, us. I’ve wanted to try experimenting with it, but death does hurt, and I’m too scared something will go wrong and I’ll die for real. For now, I just try to be careful,” he said. “And it’s always such a pain to have to find the place where I died to get my stuff before it disappears,” he added, almost like an afterthought.

“Disappears?” Alex asked, confused. He nodded, although she couldn’t see his head very well from her position.

“Yeah. If I take too long getting back, it just vanishes. I’ve tested it before, too. If I throw something on the ground and just leave it, it disappears after a few hours. I’m not sure where it goes, but all I know is that it’s gone.”

“Wow,” she mumbled. That sounded weird, and a bit creepy if she was being honest. She shivered slightly, and decided to change the subject.

“Thanks for telling me about this,” she said. “But... is there a reason you didn’t let me know before?” She felt him tense slightly below her, and immediately regretted asking. It wasn’t that big of a deal, really, and she should just open her mouth and take it back—

“I guess I just... didn’t want you to get careless,” he finally admitted. “If you know you can’t die, you start to feel invincible, even though you’re not, not really.” Steve paused before tacking on, “Trust me, I know.” He let the confession hang in the air for a bit. Alex decided that he probably had some personal experience with that one.

“Besides,” he added quietly after a moment of silence, “I wasn’t sure if you would respawn, or if it was just me. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you.” He brought his other arm (the one not playing with her hair) around and hugged her. She hugged him back, then realized with a start that he was trembling slightly.

“Hey...” she said softly. “I’m here.” She squeezed him tighter. “And I’m not going anywhere,” she added.

He sighed. “I know. Thank you, Alex.”

“Anytime, Steve.”

They stayed like that for a while, just relaxing in each others’ presence, before Alex broke the silence.

“I’m sorry for building the tower even though you told me not to,” she said guiltily. “I should have listened to you, you were right.”

He raised his head slightly to look at her. “It’s alright, I’m not mad. You just scared me, is all.”

She was a bit surprised. Yeah, she knew that he cared about her and she cared about him, but him? Scared? Steve who took on the Wither,  _scared_? It just didn’t seem possible to her.

A few more minutes passed in the companionable silence. Steve began to thread his fingers through her hair again, and she relaxed into it.

“What was it like, the first time you died?” she asked suddenly, opening her bright green eyes to glance at him. “If you don’t mind me asking, of course,” she quickly backpedaled, face flushing. Those could be traumatic memories, she should have had more tact, what kind of horrible person just up and asks somehow how they felt when they _died_?

Seemingly oblivious to Alex’s mortification, Steve only adopted a thoughtful expression. “Hmm... let me think...”

* * *

The first time Steve died, he didn’t scream.

Oh, it hurt. It hurt a  _lot_. But he didn’t bother to scream, because he didn’t want to alert any more mobs, and who would hear him anyway?

He was running, as fast as he could (which wasn’t very fast at all—he felt so tired, when was the last time he had eaten?), but it wasn’t fast enough. He was already bleeding in several places from some scratches from a zombie and two arrows from a skeleton, and he could feel himself getting weaker and weaker.

If he had any hope of surviving, he had to lose the skeleton and get back to his base. It was a temporary, ugly, hole in the wall (literally) cave, but it worked, and it was safe.

He turned sharply around a tree, and relaxed slightly when he could no longer hear the skeleton’s bones rattle, or the groan of a zombie. He looked forward again, and violently recoiled, agitating his wounds.

Right in front of him was a creeper.

He hadn’t had the misfortune of actually having one personally injure him, but he had ran past enough to know that they exploded. Literally.

It was too late to run, however. He was tired and sore, low on food and lower in health, his back was pressed against the tree (as best as he could with the arrow sticking out of the back of his shoulder, that is), and the creeper was right there.

He heard the telltale  _ssssss_ of the creeper getting ready to explode, and he squeezed his eyes shut, unable to look his certain doom in the eyes. He was done for; there was no way out.

The creeper exploded.

* * *

He woke up with a startled cry, shooting up in bed and breathing heavily. He glanced around frantically, then relaxed; just a nightmare. He was about to go back to sleep when he heard a strange noise outside his door. His hand automatically reached for his trusty iron sword, which he always kept on himself, even while sleeping.

But it wasn’t there.

Come to think of it, _nothing_ was there. His pockets were completely empty. His brow furrowed in confusion.

Did he even go to sleep? The last thing he remembered was waking up, yes, and before that was the nightmare, but...

When had he actually climbed into bed?

There was only one possible explanation he could think of. The nightmare had been real, but he had somehow been resurrected.

At first, he thought it was ridiculous. That made no sense, there was no way that was possible. He chalked up the missing stuff to him being forgetful and misplacing them, and the lack of his memory of climbing into bed was just because he was so tired he didn’t remember.

Comforted by these excuses, he went back to sleep.

The next day, the first thing he noticed was his hunger. Or, more accurately, his lack thereof.

He was always low on food, having had to resort to eating zombie flesh at one point (which was  _disgusting_—never again, he’d rather starve), but today he just... wasn’t hungry.

He searched a few chests for his sword, but he wasn’t able to find it. Shrugging, he just decided to make a new one. Sure, it had a bit of sentimental value, but it wasn’t irreplaceable.

He grabbed the two ingots needed to craft the sword, but groaned in annoyance when he realized he was out of wood. Seriously, where had his stuff gone? He shoved the ingots back into a random chest and grabbed an axe, heading out to chop down some trees.

He walked a bit into the forest before he froze. There, in front of a half-destroyed tree, was a crater.

He thought back really hard to the previous night. Vaguely, he recalled a word etched into his memory, although he didn’t know where it came from.

_Respawn._

* * *

“Shortly after that I figured it out. It was startling, to say the least.” He chuckled lightly, then raised his head to look at Alex with a fond expression.

“I’m glad you’re alright,” he said quietly.

“I’m glad you’re alright too,” she agreed.


End file.
